Inquiry looks into GP patient care

A major inquiry into the quality of GP services has been announced by a health think tank.

The King's Fund will investigate what goes on in GP surgeries and variations in the standard of care for patients.

The aim of the 18-month inquiry is to provide a series of benchmarks on what good care looks like, with the aim of driving up standards in poor practices.

Areas of potential concern include difficulties with diagnosis, such as among older patients or those with several health issues, and unacceptable delays in testing for certain cancers.

Other areas to be covered include the quality of GP referrals to specialists, rates and quality of prescribing drugs to patients, and how those with long-term conditions are cared for.

Launching the inquiry, which will report in September next year, the King's Fund said: "This is an age of increasing transparency in which good professional practice can no longer be assumed but must be demonstrated.

"What we do know is that while there are many excellent practices, there are others in which standards are not as good as they could be."

Chief executive Niall Dickson said: "General practice in this country is rightly regarded as the envy of the world. It is one of the key reasons why our healthcare system is so highly rated.

"But while the overall quality of general practice has improved, we know there are significant variations, both in the standards of individual practice and in the services provided.

"Our ambition is to help GPs and others judge the quality of what is being provided by creating a range of measures that demonstrate what high-quality patient care looks like."